An introduction to combat in White Knight Story

I could go through the entire White Knight Story demo, but there isn’t that much story to talk about. You’re on an escort mission to protect a caravan and all the way at the end you get to transform into the mammoth-sized White Knight. The demo was really a chance for attendees to get a feel for the combat system in White Knight Story.

Level 5 designed White Knight Story as an action RPG and the system lets you completely customize your seven hit combo. Through a menu you get to pick which sword strikes you want to chain together. There were a limited number of slashes in the demo, but I got a good feel for the flow. You can start out with a horizontal slash or a thrust then chain that with another ground slash and then launch an enemy up in the air with a knock up attack. Once you’re in the air you can link up the two air slashes and slam your foe back to the ground with a downwards strike. Alternatively you can end the combo by using magic to create a fireball or a shower of ice.

However, you can’t haphazardly link up attacks in White Knight Story. Each attack has an indicator of what direction the next attack has to be in. For instance you can’t use the launching attack and a ground thrust. If you set up your attack pattern like that the combo will break.

Before you initiate an attack you have to wait for the ring around you to light up. Once the ring is full you can execute the first move in the combo. Right after the first move is complete a glowing ring with the next move will pop up. You need to hit circle when it appears to do the next attack in the combo and this pattern continues until the final blow. The tricky thing is the pop up indicator for each slash has a different timing to learn. After you launch one of the armored enemies in the air, the pop up indicator takes longer to appear than if you only do ground slashes. It’s as if White Knight Story’s combat system has rhythm to it, instead of button mashing.